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And streamlining to an extent is fine, but when it actively causes plot holes that lead to massive situations being questionable (like where all the other sparrows were after the Septsplosian, what the KL Tyrells were doing after seeing the Septsplosian, why the commoners didn't revolt like crazy when Cersei has no allies, why the Lannister men weren't pissed that Cersei killed her Uncle Kevan, why Randyll Tarly wasn't informed by Olenna that the Reach is fighting for Dany, why Olenna even succeeded Mace in a supposed patriarchy, why anyone accepted Cersei succeeding Tommen in the first place, etc, etc), then it's too much.

You're right, streamlining's existed right from S1E1, but it's began to slip from 'making something adaptable' to 'writing as if the audience has no concept of abstract concept or object permanence, and sadly being vindicated in this cynical worldview'. After all, any sufficiently attached audience member that does have abstract concept permanence (and thus a frontal lobe) is too emotionally pot-committed to call a spade a spade and will come up with their own convoluted explanation for them, so why should D & D bother?

The question is does the show provide an emotionally rich and satisfying experience enough to where an audience member either won't think too hard about something or is fine filling in the blanks.

Does it make sense that Luke is sadder at losing Obi Wan a guy he knew for a week at best than Leia is at losing her entire planet and family that she knew for her entire life? If you think about it its pretty stupid that that should be the case. Either that makes the story ridiculous or you just assume that she grieved off screen and get on with it.

Every work of art is like that. More so visual art that is restricted by time and the need to keep people captivated and entertained.

If GoT is asking you to make assumptions your not comfortable making or asking you to make them on too many questions than it just might not be the show for you.

Personally speaking, the show provides me with enough emotionally satisfying moments and story bears that i am willing to fill in blanks that need to be filled or overlook things i find highly implausible (Euron and your 1000 new ships I am looking at you).

But a lot of the things you mention are stuff that is not that difficult to come to terms with if you want to. Whether you want to or not really just goes back to the question of how emotionally satisfying are you finding the story.

Just take Cersei and whether there should have been a rebellion or not. How many times in history has a leader cracked down on the population or group of people in a vicious manner? How many times has a rebellion followed? I am willing to bet that less than 20% of the time people rebel after a vicious crackdown. Way less i would bet but lets say its 20%. If thats the base rate, than the fact that there was no rebellion is not that hard to explain or really asking the audience to accept something implausible.

" VARYS: Cersei controls fewer than half the Seven Kingdoms. The lord of Westeros despise her. Even before your arrival, they plotted against her. Now...

DAENERYS: They cry out for their true queen? They drink secret toasts to my health?

...

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Jabul said: She could have better PR though. This is another rather implausible failing of her advisers.

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Megorova said:

2. It was her own failure. If she wanted to be recognised by people of Westeros, she should have went to them, initiated comunication with royal Houses, showed herself to people. Instead she settled on Dragonstone, and expected that people will come to her castle, and bend the knee before her throne, and ask her to be their Queen.

1. First of all, it's not primarily a question of who believes what. There are Targ supporters in Westeros. Robert Baratheon himself acknowledged this. The fact that some houses supported Aerys indicates this; I see know reason why this support would have just vanished in the intervening years. The fact that Barristan traveled a long distance to pledge fealty to Daenerys shows this.

The quote you provide shows that Daenerys doesn't buy into all the "secret toasts" and "cry out for their queen" stuff. This could very well mean that she knows the stuff fed to Viserys was seriously exaggerated. It doesn't mean she thinks there is no support for her. Also note that she doesn't deny that the lords of Westeros despise Cersei. If it comes to a choice, the dragon queen could still be the better one. Even someone who believed that the Pentosi cheese monger told only lies to Viserys would see that.

2. So? This does not harm my case. It supports it. I don't think that she expected people to just show up at her castle. However, she, or Varys, or Tyrion should have at least sent Ravens to as many important houses as possible. This is common procedure. It was, for example, what Stannis did when he made his claim. The thrust of my argument is not that Daenerys Targaryen is a great leader. It is that Season 7 shows too many characters acting out of character. Your point #2 simply indicates that D&D fed "stupid pills" to Dany along with her advisers.

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1. What good stories? Do you mean the one where she came to region where slavery was a natural course of life, broke their social structure, butchered nobles, and ex-slaves rebelled against her for ruining their lives and bringing chaos to their world?

Or maybe this good story?->

"....

2. For westerosi she is still nothing more than 'mad king's daughter'. They don't know her.

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Jabul said: The "evil you know" argument is weak. For one thing, Cersei is hated by many people. These people have no experience with Dany and thus no reason to hate her.

''''/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

3. And no reason to love her, or respect, or trust her.

''''////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Jabul said: Why would we presume that these reports and rumors were predominantly negative in regard to the Mother of Dragons and Breaker of Chains?

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4. Mother of Dragons <- monster.

Breaker of Chains <- creator of chaos.

1. Is that supposed to be a serious question? Do you not know who Barristan Selmy was? Why couldn't reports of his devotion to the dragon queen have reached Westeros? Are you not familiar with the fact that huge numbers of former slaves love her? Reports of their devotion could also have come to the western continent. The fact the queen did some bad things and that some people in Essos hate her cannot rationally be used as proof that no good news about her would have traveled west.

And then there is Missandei, and there are the Unsullied. You are familiar with them, aren't you? They aren't just rumors. They are actually now in Westeros. They can talk to people. They will have only good things to say about their queen.

2. How do you know that the Westerosi only think of her as the mad queen's daughter? Have you taken a poll of the population?

3. So? If they neither love her nor hate her, trust her nor distrust her, respect her or disrespect her, then there is no reason why at least some lords wouldn't send representatives to talk to her. She sure as hell is powerful I think by now you can see I don't mind repeating myself--

Stupid pills. A severe overdose of stupid pills.

Daenerys and her advisers should absolutely have done a better job of communicating. Even without said communication, however, lords concerned about their wealth, their lands, and their lives should have reached out to this woman with the huge army and the three dragons.

4. Who, besides you and the slavers, links these things so closely? Do you have any evidence at all that some guys working the docks in, say, King's Landing or White Harbor would hear stories from the east and make these connections?

On 9/15/2017 at 7:40 PM, Megorova said:

If she would've came with dragon and attacked first, only with dragon, then her enemies would've just scattered all over those fields. So, in this case, she will need to chase after each and every soldier and burn them all one by one, and one, and one, and one, and one, and one, and one more... breathe, Drogon, breathe, just few more thousands to burn She needed Dothraki there, to engage enemy soldiers in a fight, or chase after them. So Dothraki were mingled among enemy troops, thus she needed to be careful not to burn them too. And she brought one dragon to deliver precise spot fire instead of an all covering carpet attack.

On 9/15/2017 at 7:40 PM, Megorova said:

Jabul's reply--And once again with feeling: Characters in Season 7 all too often act out of character. You have a bunch of lords of the Reach who, for some reason or other, trust a creepy guy and an untested weapon; these "leaders" either are ignorant of the history of Westeros or have no regard for what dragons can do to them and their men. Competent military commanders would know that a quick attack by dragons could wipe out a huge number of soldiers. That is what happened at the Field of Fire . There was no need to chase fighters down one by one. Besides, an initial attack by dragons does not preclude the presence of Dothraki on the battlefield. Hell, they could have had the enemy surrounded. They could have just let the dragons go in first.

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The difference here is that there isn't anyone left to challenge cersei. And the smallfolk of KL aren't going to storm the Red Keep just to die in the process. Winter is here and they will be more concerned about their own survival.

There's a majority of Westeros left to challenge Cersei. Or would be in the absence of the threat of the Army of the Dead. Still enough to overthrow her several times over.

Every nobleperson in the kingdoms who cares about the faith, the laws of succession, traditional morality, and not being ruled by a crazy person is left to challenge her. Which is why instead of the entire 7 Kingdoms at best 3--the West, part of the Reach, and the Iron Islands (though not all of the Ironborn)--are on her side. Don't know about the Riverlands or Stormlands, but as soon as she called herself Queen the rest of the Kingdoms could have sent their people in to depose her.

This whole idea that she got to rule because she happened to be in King's Landing with no one present to oppose her is asinine. At best she gets to sit the Iron Throne for as long as it takes most of the rest of the country plus that foreign bitch and her dragons to show up. Whoopdeedoo.

As for the small folk, if they can't breach the Red Keep they can make life a living hell for Team Lannister. How would you like to rule a city of a million people in revolt? When you don't care about your ancestral home anymore and that's in fact your only seat of power. What, does Jaime run around outside the walls with his army and Cersei and Qyburn communicate through ravens because they're imprisoned in the Keep just like she was in Season Five?

Even if it works, talk about a fearsome projection of power to your enemies. Cersei might as well rule from a cave like a true supervillain.

As for their own survival, what do they have to gain by war? Which is inevitable with Cersei as queen, Dany or no Dang. It's already costing them food with winter here.

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There was nobody left to command the armies, if they survived the blast at the sept. And I'm sure cersei wouldn't have forgotten about the Tyrell soldiers.

It doesn't matter whether Cersei remembered them or not. She didn't have any power to make a move until after the poop hit the fan. Remember, she was under house arrest, Jaime was out of town, Tommen was king, the Kingsguard were loyal to him, and I don't even know if the City Watch was operational. Doesn't matter, because it was literally Cersei, Qyburn, Zombie Mountain, and the little kids on Team Cersei. That's it.

By the time she secures authority over what's left of the city, Tyrell forces commanded by footsoldiers would've known enough to at least flee the city. Certainly they wouldn't sit around, distracted, waiting to be slaughtered.

We're shown many shots of the Sept and everything around it. No Tyrell army is present to be blown up. What was Marge's freakout about if they have the Sept secured by her father's army? Nevermind, because that moment made no sense any way you look at it.

Their lord was in the Sept, and maybe some higher-ranking officers, but are we to assume no one was left outside capable of taking command? They were all waiting inside to see Cersei's doom? Did they not even leave a sergeant out of the show?

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What happened with the Russian who escaped in the woods in the Sopranos? Does he no longer exist or is it just not important.

The Sopranos screwed with the audience like that on purpose often. In the case of the Russian, it didn't really matter. Tony's relationship with the Russian mob was a minor storyline, and apparently his death or survival didn't lead to any further trouble.

It's annoying when they leave things hanging like that, but their defense is always along the lines of "that's life." There are true mysteries in the world. That one wasn't so annoying as "What does cut to black mean?" in the finale.

There's a difference between stuff you can leave out because it's not necessary to know and stuff that affects the plausibility of events for the part of the story we care about. Okay, it's implausible for a man to apparently get shot in the head then disappear. But that didn't make subsequent events we saw implausible . It was a one-off.

With Cersei as queen, on the other hand, there are a billion hanging implausibilities. You can say, "Aw, who cares, we're following her story now and don't need to know how the pieces fell into place for this or that." But we do need to know at least some of the more glaring problems. The effect of missing links for why she's sitting on the throne is to derail the ongoing story. Because it keeps affecting the plot, episode after episode.

Plus, with her every action, and the actions of every character who has an effect on her storyline, implausibilities pile up. And we're never getting even an acknowledgement, like Christopher and Paulie acknowledged the Russian's Rambo-like survival skills.

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The Sopranos screwed with the audience like that on purpose often. In the case of the Russian, it didn't really matter. Tony's relationship with the Russian mob was a minor storyline, and apparently his death or survival didn't lead to any further trouble.

It's annoying when they leave things hanging like that, but their defense is always along the lines of "that's life." There are true mysteries in the world. That one wasn't so annoying as "What does cut to black mean?" in the finale.

There's a difference between stuff you can leave out because it's not necessary to know and stuff that affects the plausibility of events for the part of the story we care about. Okay, it's implausible for a man to apparently get shot in the head then disappear. But that didn't make subsequent events we saw implausible . It was a one-off.

With Cersei as queen, on the other hand, there are a billion hanging implausibilities. You can say, "Aw, who cares, we're following her story now and don't need to know how the pieces fell into place for this or that." But we do need to know at least some of the more glaring problems. The effect of missing links for why she's sitting on the throne is to derail the ongoing story. Because it keeps affecting the plot, episode after episode.

Plus, with her every action, and the actions of every character who has an effect on her storyline, implausibilities pile up. And we're never getting even an acknowledgement, like Christopher and Paulie acknowledged the Russian's Rambo-like survival skills.

I was specifically referring to Dorne. At this point what is going on in Dorne has no relevance to the main plot other that what we got. There is no leader and so its not an actor. How that leadership struggle is resolved will or won't come back depending on how it impacts the main story.

Regarding Cersei specifically I agree its not an equivalent situation as she is clearly a main player that impacts the other players.

I personally don't find it implausible that she is in power though:

A.) 1 because as the show says she controls three Kingdoms at best - Stormlands, Riverlands and Westerlands.

B.) i think the likliehood of a revolt is far less likely than many people here assume because a lot of times when people violently repress uprisings its succesful

C.) Daenerys is a hero to us because we get her POV and see she is a good person. If we didn't get her POV she fits the classic evil sorceresss trope plus her father has the worst reputation of anyone on the show. The shadow her father casts is so large that even her own advisors who worship her worry about it, at least the Westerosi ones.

D.) xenophobia is an incredibly powerful motivator

What i found actually difficult to swallow was less Cersei's position at the beggining of the season and more the success she had in Episode 2 and 3 wiping Dany's southern allies off the map, specifically how Euron's fleet happened to be in the right place at the right time twice and functioned as a great equalizer.

Felt like a computer game getting more difficult to even the score. Hmm. Opponent getting too powerful lets give this person 1000 ships and the ability to locate the enemy fleet twice when desired.

I also have a hard time beleiving that lords from across Westeros don't start making overtures to Dany looking to bend the knee after her display of power in episode 4 and they hear what happened to the Tarlys or that there was no diplomacy and backchannel communication happening between Team Dany and the nobility below the level of the great houses.

I had imagined that Cersei would be left being nothing more than the mayor of Kings Landing since the other houses would act like sheep.

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Oh, okay, then. It's not like a whole war started because people merely suspected Joffrey might be illegitimate. Nor did a mob tried to murder him.

And it's not like pastry chefs in the only restaurant in the Riverlands know Cersei blew up the Sept. That's the sorta thing regular people suspend judgement about. Because innocent until proven guilty, if that concept even exists in Westeros.

Actually most people involved in the war starting didn't even know Joffrey was illegitimate. Renly was just going into business for himself. Robb just knew his father and sisters were held hostage and Lannister's tried to kill his brother. Balon just thought now was a good time to strike. Stannis was the only one that actually knew and he was in the worst position of the 4 rebelling against the throne when the war initially broke out. Had Robb/Renly specifically not rebelled, Stannis was screwed and would have struggled to actually make any meaningful effort, and likely would have been dealt with fast.

Again it comes down to you overestimating Cersei's support. She has the Lannister's who would never leave her, a portion of the Reach who found a queen that had a blood relation to the line of succession more palatable than the daughter of an ousted king, and she had whatever remained of the cities watch and KingsGuard. It's just that Westeros is fractured it doesn't matter. John has a weakened North and the Vale. Dany has an army of Dothraki and Unsullied and a fraction of the IronBorn and a portion of the Reach.

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Actually most people involved in the war starting didn't even know Joffrey was illegitimate. Renly was just going into business for himself. Robb just knew his father and sisters were held hostage and Lannister's tried to kill his brother. Balon just thought now was a good time to strike. Stannis was the only one that actually knew and he was in the worst position of the 4 rebelling against the throne when the war initially broke out. Had Robb/Renly specifically not rebelled, Stannis was screwed and would have struggled to actually make any meaningful effort, and likely would have been dealt with fast.

Whatever Stannis' initial position, he came within a hair's breadth of taking King's Landing, and he was there to press his claim based on Joffrey's illegitimacy.

Had Stannis not assassinated Renly, Renly likely would've taken King's Landing, and there's no doubt in my mind he would've used Joffrey's illegitimacy as justification.

Rob was already at war with the Lannisters, and he was acclaimed King of the North for a variety of reasons. One of which no doubt was Joffrey's illegitimacy.

The War of Five Kings started for many reasons. It wasn't Joffrey's illegitimacy alone. But the fight with Stannis, at least, was mainly caused by it. And that was a large enough conflict to call a war.

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Again it comes down to you overestimating Cersei's support. She has the Lannister's who would never leave her, a portion of the Reach who found a queen that had a blood relation to the line of succession more palatable than the daughter of an ousted king, and she had whatever remained of the cities watch and KingsGuard. It's just that Westeros is fractured it doesn't matter. John has a weakened North and the Vale. Dany has an army of Dothraki and Unsullied and a fraction of the IronBorn and a portion of the Reach.

I'm not the one overestimating Cersei's strength. She has what should be a severely weakened Lannister army, part of the Reach, and Urine's share of the Ironborn (Which apparently includes a thousand ships he built overnight.) That's it. I'm not counting the Kingsguard or the City Watch because they're not real armies.

Westeros is indeed fractured, but there is enough to easily overwhelm her, especially considering the idiotic way they fought in the Reach and Westerlands. Fortunately for her, Tyrion was even more idiotic. (Or was that on purpose?) Leave the North and the Vale out of it, plus the Riverlands and the Stormlands, which have disappeared from the plot. That leaves a good chunk of the Reach and Ironborn, plus, you know, 100,000 Dothraki, the Unsullied, and three frickin' dragons.

Oh yeah, and Dorne. Which doesn't matter to the show, but if you look at a map would kinda have to matter.

Cersei should be toast in an episode. Even the Iron Bank should be abandoning her, with or without the Highgarden gold. The show kept her on the throne for no better reason than they like the actress.

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The question is does the show provide an emotionally rich and satisfying experience enough to where an audience member either won't think too hard about something or is fine filling in the blanks.

Does it make sense that Luke is sadder at losing Obi Wan a guy he knew for a week at best than Leia is at losing her entire planet and family that she knew for her entire life? If you think about it its pretty stupid that that should be the case. Either that makes the story ridiculous or you just assume that she grieved off screen and get on with it.

Every work of art is like that. More so visual art that is restricted by time and the need to keep people captivated and entertained.

If GoT is asking you to make assumptions your not comfortable making or asking you to make them on too many questions than it just might not be the show for you.

Personally speaking, the show provides me with enough emotionally satisfying moments and story bears that i am willing to fill in blanks that need to be filled or overlook things i find highly implausible (Euron and your 1000 new ships I am looking at you).

But a lot of the things you mention are stuff that is not that difficult to come to terms with if you want to. Whether you want to or not really just goes back to the question of how emotionally satisfying are you finding the story.

Just take Cersei and whether there should have been a rebellion or not. How many times in history has a leader cracked down on the population or group of people in a vicious manner? How many times has a rebellion followed? I am willing to bet that less than 20% of the time people rebel after a vicious crackdown. Way less i would bet but lets say its 20%. If thats the base rate, than the fact that there was no rebellion is not that hard to explain or really asking the audience to accept something implausible.

The problem I have is they introduce arcs like the Dornish one which, if they truly wanted to streamline, they could have just done away with it completely. Instead they introduce something, realise they've written themselves into a hole, and then go 'oh well, we can just abruptly drop this by killing prominent character X, after that all their smallfolk and armies will vanish to our average viewer'.

It's what happened when they realised Olenna swearing 'wevenge' instead of just dying in the Septsplosion was giving Dany too much power, so they had her slip on a banana and die because 'Tyrell men suddenly can't fight, lol', and same with Ellaria and Dorne. They tryharded to fit in the 'Vengeance. Justice. Fire and Blood.' line from the books without the original context, which then made Dany OP and kept one of the most reviled storylines alive to the audience, so they hastily scrapped it at the beginning of S7.

The whole thing just reeks of a lack of forward planning and a lack of basic instinctual foresight.

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The problem I have is they introduce arcs like the Dornish one which, if they truly wanted to streamline, they could have just done away with it completely. Instead they introduce something, realise they've written themselves into a hole, and then go 'oh well, we can just abruptly drop this by killing prominent character X, after that all their smallfolk and armies will vanish to our average viewer'.

It's what happened when they realised Olenna swearing 'wevenge' instead of just dying in the Septsplosion was giving Dany too much power, so they had her slip on a banana and die because 'Tyrell men suddenly can't fight, lol', and same with Ellaria and Dorne. They tryharded to fit in the 'Vengeance. Justice. Fire and Blood.' line from the books without the original context, which then made Dany OP and kept one of the most reviled storylines alive to the audience, so they hastily scrapped it at the beginning of S7.

The whole thing just reeks of a lack of forward planning and a lack of basic instinctual foresight.

I don't think its a lack of forward planning. They mapped out everything back in season 3 and 4 to set up the end game according to everything I have read.

It might have been poorly executed for some.

As a viewer it was certainly disappinting to see Cersei declare war in 6x10, Olena through in with Dany only to have Cersei take her out in 7x03.

Although thinking about it I think Dorne and Highgarden were less questions of making Dany too powerful that needed to be fixed and more likely giving Dany things she could easily lose so that Cersei could have some easy wins and her revenge on those reposinble for the death of her two eldest without truly altering the balance of power between them.

On the whole though I don't think highgarden was poorly done. In 4x05 they introduce that Casterly Rock is useless. In 6x06 they introduce Tarly as a xenophobe setting up why he would not fight for Dany. Jaime said in 7x01 that they should attack Highgarden. In 7x02 Tarly defects and in 7x03 they attack leveraging what was introduced in 4x05 and get a scene that many people thougt was one of the best in the whole season.

My whole problem is more just Euron. Him getting so many ships so quickly and him being at the right place right time twice. Was so weird how succesful he was that it does feel like there is either a traitor in Dany's camp or a little bird hanging out in dragonstone. And they don't address it all season so its not clear how we should interpret it or whether we are supposed to rely on the scenes from season 6 when the little birds are stolen away and Cersei says we need to send them everywhere to make sense of it and that we should infer a little bird was sent to dragonstone because in 7x01 she asks Jaime where Dany will land and he correctly predicts Dragonstone.

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On the whole though I don't think highgarden was poorly done. In 4x05 they introduce that Casterly Rock is useless.

Why ? How do people come to this assumption ? Because a huge castle has no goldmine ? With this conclusion all castles in Westeros should be useless. I don't get it. In what world is a huge castle useless ? Harrenhal was not useless although it was a ruin. Moat Cailin is not useless although it's a ruin. Storm's End is not useless and I bet Storm's end has no goldmine.

Highgarden was not poorly done but the attack on CR was. It would have been far more powerful as a revenge for Highgarden while the Lannister army was not there. But I guess we can't have revenge on Cersei. You need a 7 season Sansa story arc for that.

And regarding Tarly: Dany should have used the Dothraki to plunder something (or simply lost control over them). That would have fixed his logic.

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I don't think its a lack of forward planning. They mapped out everything back in season 3 and 4 to set up the end game according to everything I have read.

It might have been poorly executed for some.

As a viewer it was certainly disappinting to see Cersei declare war in 6x10, Olena through in with Dany only to have Cersei take her out in 7x03.

Although thinking about it I think Dorne and Highgarden were less questions of making Dany too powerful that needed to be fixed and more likely giving Dany things she could easily lose so that Cersei could have some easy wins and her revenge on those reposinble for the death of her two eldest without truly altering the balance of power between them.

On the whole though I don't think highgarden was poorly done. In 4x05 they introduce that Casterly Rock is useless. In 6x06 they introduce Tarly as a xenophobe setting up why he would not fight for Dany. Jaime said in 7x01 that they should attack Highgarden. In 7x02 Tarly defects and in 7x03 they attack leveraging what was introduced in 4x05 and get a scene that many people thougt was one of the best in the whole season.

My whole problem is more just Euron. Him getting so many ships so quickly and him being at the right place right time twice. Was so weird how succesful he was that it does feel like there is either a traitor in Dany's camp or a little bird hanging out in dragonstone. And they don't address it all season so its not clear how we should interpret it or whether we are supposed to rely on the scenes from season 6 when the little birds are stolen away and Cersei says we need to send them everywhere to make sense of it and that we should infer a little bird was sent to dragonstone because in 7x01 she asks Jaime where Dany will land and he correctly predicts Dragonstone.

Agreed in that Euron's respawning and teleporting fleet is the most egregious aspect of it all, but I dunno. I can't overlook that the same army that saved the Lannisters' asses in Season 2 were defeated by a war-of-the-five-kings-depleted Lannister army, especially when they were in their stronghold on the bloody defensive like others seemingly can, but I will admit Euron's the most ridiculous aspect.

I mean, he kills Dany's ironborn fleet by magically knowing where they are and teleporting to them, then somehow teleports his navy across the bloody continent to lock the Unsullied in Casterly Rock (which turns out to have no effect anyway, as they show up in KL none the worse). All for Cersei, who hasn't promised him anything in advance and obviously has no intention of marrying him.

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Agreed in that Euron's respawning and teleporting fleet is the most egregious aspect of it all, but I dunno. I can't overlook that the same army that saved the Lannisters' asses in Season 2 were defeated by a war-of-the-five-kings-depleted Lannister army, especially when they were in their stronghold on the bloody defensive like others seemingly can, but I will admit Euron's the most ridiculous aspect.

I mean, he kills Dany's ironborn fleet by magically knowing where they are and teleporting to them, then somehow teleports his navy across the bloody continent to lock the Unsullied in Casterly Rock (which turns out to have no effect anyway, as they show up in KL none the worse). All for Cersei, who hasn't promised him anything in advance and obviously has no intention of marrying him.

In fairness locking the unsullied was supposed to have the effect Jaime said. Force them to abandon the Castle and cross the continent via land because they couldn't resupply them via sea which technically is what happens although they abandon the castle for different reasons and under different circumstances since establishing a supply line via the Reach is possible post field of fire.

But yea the whole Euron stuff is weirdly convenient. We better find out there was a stinking little bird on dragonstone next season and have them address their intelligence failures or its going to be super frustrating.

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I'm not the one overestimating Cersei's strength. She has what should be a severely weakened Lannister army, part of the Reach, and Urine's share of the Ironborn (Which apparently includes a thousand ships he built overnight.) That's it. I'm not counting the Kingsguard or the City Watch because they're not real armies.

Westeros is indeed fractured, but there is enough to easily overwhelm her, especially considering the idiotic way they fought in the Reach and Westerlands. Fortunately for her, Tyrion was even more idiotic. (Or was that on purpose?) Leave the North and the Vale out of it, plus the Riverlands and the Stormlands, which have disappeared from the plot. That leaves a good chunk of the Reach and Ironborn, plus, you know, 100,000 Dothraki, the Unsullied, and three frickin' dragons.

Oh yeah, and Dorne. Which doesn't matter to the show, but if you look at a map would kinda have to matter.

Cersei should be toast in an episode. Even the Iron Bank should be abandoning her, with or without the Highgarden gold. The show kept her on the throne for no better reason than they like the actress.

There's only one House that hasn't sustained damages though and that's the Vale.

The North fought the same war against the Lannister's, lost many men, lost key figures at the Red Wedding, and then has a civil war against the Bolton's where countless Northerners died. The Reach was fighting battles for the Lannister's, they lost their paramount House, the region split, a good chunk died in the siege on Highgarden, another good chunk died when Dany fought them. Dorne didn't really fight, but they are leaderless right now and probably out of the entire game. The IronBorn fought wars against the North and now are split. The Riverlands is just a complete disaster. And the Stormlands are directionless.

I think everybody in the show acknowledged how out numbered Cersei was. But Jon never gave a damn about fighting Cersei because of the war against the undead. He was never going to waste men on that unless it came to his doorstep. From the Northern perspective, they are fighting for independence, they are in a region where nobody could ever siege it for several years now because it's winter, and the two armies that might try to conquer them are going to battle it out.

So that really only left Cersei vs Dany. Where again it was widely stated that on a level playing field in open combat, Dany would crush Cersei. It's just Cersei really isn't giving her that. Also there is the fear of destroying King's Landing could compromise Dany's cause. Dany has a good army, but not a good siege army so she could waste many men trying to siege King's Landing where the payoff might be that Cersei goes yolo and blows it all up.

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Why ? How do people come to this assumption ? Because a huge castle has no goldmine ? With this conclusion all castles in Westeros should be useless. I don't get it. In what world is a huge castle useless ? Harrenhal was not useless although it was a ruin. Moat Cailin is not useless although it's a ruin. Storm's End is not useless and I bet Storm's end has no goldmine.

Casterly Rock was important because of its gold. Without the gold its just a castle with a nice seaside view. Still a nice castle to have. But if you can switch it for Highgarden you make that trade. If it still had gold mines you don't.

22 minutes ago, SirArthur said:

Highgarden was not poorly done but the attack on CR was. It would have been far more powerful as a revenge for Highgarden while the Lannister army was not there. But I guess we can't have revenge on Cersei. You need a 7 season Sansa story arc for that.

It will come next year.

22 minutes ago, SirArthur said:

And regarding Tarly: Dany should have used the Dothraki to plunder something (or simply lost control over them). That would have fixed his logic.

Not really sure that was necessary. Its not like people don't know what the dothraki are about. Bobbie B knew all about them in season 1.

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Agreed in that Euron's respawning and teleporting fleet is the most egregious aspect of it all, but I dunno. I can't overlook that the same army that saved the Lannisters' asses in Season 2 were defeated by a war-of-the-five-kings-depleted Lannister army, especially when they were in their stronghold on the bloody defensive like others seemingly can, but I will admit Euron's the most ridiculous aspect.

I mean, he kills Dany's ironborn fleet by magically knowing where they are and teleporting to them, then somehow teleports his navy across the bloody continent to lock the Unsullied in Casterly Rock (which turns out to have no effect anyway, as they show up in KL none the worse). All for Cersei, who hasn't promised him anything in advance and obviously has no intention of marrying him.

Several key points.

The entire Lannister army was not fighting at Blackwater by any stretch. Tywin had most of the army off fighting in the Riverlands. Lannister and Tyrell forces came back to save them. That same army that saved King's Landing was fractured by the head of the main house being killed, them being spread out for Dany's cause, and Tarly bringing over some banners to the Lannister. They also had to battle in the least advantageous homefield of any region.

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Deus-Ex-Euron is more or less the only thing I can't rationalize this season;

- How did he manage to build the iron armada in less than half a year?A season is roughly 1 year long, they started in S6E5. By S7E1 the fleet is finished.
- How did he manage to find Yara's fleet in the middle of the ocean in the middle of the night? Even with a spy at Dragonstone this would be nigh impossible.
- How did he know that the remainder of the Targaryen-fleet had sailed to Casterly Rock, and how did he manage to show up exactly after the battle had commenced?
- Why is he so loyal to Cersei that he would do all the above things and continue to plot to backstab Team Dany when they're trying to save the entire realm? She has done nothing to earn neither his loyalty or his trust, quite the opposite in fact. If he ends up handing over the Golden Company to her, no questions asked I'm gonna be pissed. (Don't think this will happen actually.)
- Why would he antagonize Jamie the way he does? I admit that it made me chuckle, but from a logical standpoint, antagonizing the brother of the woman you want to marry, and the general of the armed forces to the house you want to marry into seems ...counter-productive to say the least.